The newly-released photographs give a revealing insight into the chubby despot's 'war room' and the key military people behind him who will support any decision to attack.

The images, released by the nation's state media, show the dictator examining satellite images of the US Air Force base in Guam as other maps of operational zones in South Korea and Japan hang all over walls behind him.

Pictured for the first time in weeks, Kim is seen holding a baton and pointing at a map reading "Strategic Force's Firing Strike Plan".

Kim Jong-un is flanked by other army generals including Kim Jong Sik, a veteran rocket scientist and one of the masterminds behind North Korea's missile programme.

The map showed a flight path for the missiles appearing to start from North Korea's east coast, then flying over Japan and ending near Guam, as Pyongyang announced last week.

The launch location seen in the map appeared to be in the vicinity of Sinpo, the east coastal city that hosts North Korea's submarine base, said Kim Dong-yub, a military expert at Kyungnam University's Institute of Far Eastern Studies in Seoul.

Kim Jong-un said the location near Sinpo fits with what North Korea outlined last week - that four intermediate-range missiles will cross the sky above Shimane, Hiroshima and Koichi Prefectures of Japan.

Tension on the Korean peninsula has risen over North Korea's nuclear weapons programme.

North Korea and the United States have been exchanging a flurry of strong rhetoric, each threatening military action, in recent days.

But Kim Jong-un appears to have dropped plans to launch a missile at the US - for now.

Kim Jong-un, who praised the army for drawing up a "close and careful plan", said he will watch the actions of the United States for a while longer before making a decision on whether to go ahead with missile launches toward the US Pacific territory of Guam, a report said.

Pyongyang's state media said the rogue nation’s leader "examined the plan for a long time" after his army chiefs handed him a proposal.

North Korea said last week that it would finalise by mid-August its detailed plan to fire four intermediate-range ballistic missiles up to 18 miles off Guam’s coast.

The country’s army is now awaiting Kim’s approval.

(Image: AFP)

(Image: AFP)

A confusing statement issued via state media said Jong Un warned that "...if the Yankees persist in their extremely dangerous reckless actions on the Korean peninsula and in its vicinity, testing the self-restraint of the DPRK, the latter will make an important decision as it already declared."

Guam, a Pacific island which is home to two US military bases, strategic bombers and about 163,000 people, is more than 1,800 miles from North Korea.

The plan is the latest provocation in a back-and-forth with Washington, which came to a head last week when President Donald Trump appeared to threaten nuclear war on the pariah state.

"North Korea best not make any more threats to the United States," said the US leader.

"They will be met with fire, fury and frankly power the likes of which this world has never seen before.”

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The sudden escalation in tensions came after US intelligence analysts had assessed North Korea had produced a miniaturised nuclear warhead.

Such a development would mean Kim is a step closer to having the capability of striking the US with a nuclear-tipped missile.

There is no indication that their Hwasong-12 missiles mentioned in the Guam plan would be tipped with nuclear warheads.

In 2013 when tensions ran high as North Korea threatened missile strikes on US Pacific bases, including Guam and Hawaii, it also released photographs of Kim Jong-un inside his military command centre signing the order to put rockets on standby to attack the US mainland.

The pictures then showed a large chart titled "US mainland strike plan" and it was seen targeting US regions such as Hawaii, Washington D.C, and Texas.

North Korea has never carried out its threats to hit US Pacific bases or mainland.